


A Bullet With Your Name On It

by metalboxes



Category: 2000 AD (Comics), Judge Dredd (Comics), Judge Dredd - All Media Types, Strontium Dog
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-25 18:15:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14982800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/metalboxes/pseuds/metalboxes
Summary: SoulhateAU - where the name of your fated enemy is written on your body.





	A Bullet With Your Name On It

They run a match for it on the systems, once they find out.

 

Of course they do. A name like that, on one of Fargo's clones? If someone's going to be the fated antagonistic half of one of two fastest rising stars in the Academy of Law, you better believe they'd keep an eye on it.

 

Traning is exhausting, and every night he falls into bed and falls into a dreamless slumber. But on some nights that are more difficult than others, when aggression isn't worked out in sparring, when his teeth grind and he doesn't know why, he has dreams of the chase. His boots pounding the ground, gaining on a figure that's always just a little out of his reach until suddenly he grabs them, closing his hand around an insubstantial wrist. He dreams of two hollow points of light in a darkness, of the shadow of a face turning to face him. He always wakes up before he can see more, fingertips tingling with anticipation and frustration. Nights like those, he reaches out to Rico and they fight it out on the floor. They don't talk about their names, and especially not Rico's.

 

It becomes Dredd's personal mission. Every week like clockwork, he goes into the central data banks and requests a scan for any instance of the name. Still no answer. With the years that pass by, Dredd grows more and more frustrated. Whoever it is, he must be good, incredibly good, to have laid this low for so long. And to think that this enemy will be worse than any they've had so far.

 

It never comes up, not one arrest, or link to any suspicious happening. They consult intel pulled from other Mega-cities around the world - they have plenty of blind spots in that regard. He could be making a name for himself in the lawless, anonymous ruins of Cinquid Barracuda. He could be building up a base in Hondo City. He could be living under an assumed name on Luna One. It becomes his weekly ritual, the one task he takes upon himself to complete.

 

The longer he goes without a match, the more nervous people get. The Judge Child, Apocalypse War, Necropolis, all pass without a single mention. The Big Meg faces down disaster after disaster, and Dredd racks up more of a reputation - Senior Street Judge, the Mega City Lawman, Old Stoneface -- Dredd  _becomes_  the face of the city.  His destiny is linked with Mega City One, whether he likes it or not. They're all gearing up for the day it happens. An enemy worse than the Dark Judges or Owen Khrysler is hard to imagine. How could it be worse?

 

Then one day, the world ends and a figure appears, with a gun in one hand and all the answers in the other. 

 

 

Johnny Alpha is irresponsible.  Alpha is pathetic. He’s any other punk on the street, just another mutie mercenary with a couple fancy tricks.

 

He’s not a corrupt Judge. He’s not a powerful psychic. He’s not a head of a crime syndicate spanning continents. He’s not even stronger than Dredd is. Dredd could pin him to the ground with one hand around his wrists and his body weight alone, and he does.

 

He’s a powerful psi to be sure, but far outclassed by what the Department has at its disposal. He’s more… raw. An unrefined material not yet chipped away by the laws and lessons society demands. He’s always lived slightly outside it, and it shows.

 

And the most irritating part of all this is, he doesn’t seem to know or care who Dredd is at all, other than _that_ _fascist sneck-head who tried to arrest me for doing my damn job_.

 

Dredd isn't bothered.

 

Really.

 

* * *

 

Johnny dreams sometimes, of black leather and the hard slash of a frown. Of a cold, curt attitude and a tense-set jaw.

 

His dreams are always vivid, and his nightmares moreso. Which is why he doesn’t take notice when his subconscious seems to want to discuss Dredd more and more for some reason.

 

He can almost see it, when his eyes are closed, licking the inside of his mouth and tasting blood. He dreams of blood coating his knuckles, bruises emblazoned black and blue on his skin. Of a raspy voice, low and harsh and grating in his ear. Making demands.

 

When he wakes up, the letters stand stark against his skin. Emblazoned against his knuckles, a simple, steadfast fact of existence, like the person whose name it belongs to. He turns his fist to himself, staring down the oncoming flat plane of his fist, and resists the urge to punch himself in the face.

 

Johnny breathes out, low and quiet, and stares at the dark ceiling. "You have got to be snecking kidding me. Why now?

 

He stops, sits up, and really thinks about this.

 

Johnny is tired of love.

 

But he remembers the taste of blood on his teeth and when he closes his eyes, the memory of Dredd stands stark against the black of his eyelids.

 

His anger when Wulf died was a cold, freezing burn that lasted him the weeks until he enacted his vengeance, and then many months after that. Hatred is something Johnny can nurture for years without burning out. He did it for Kreelman, and he did it for Wulf too. It's a burning hearth that Johnny feeds, sat in front on his haunches, sated with bodies and blood.

 

What Dredd provokes from the shallows of his soul is different. It's a roiling heat, a temper that flushes his face red in anger. Dredd feels like a splinter under his nail he can't remove, embedding himself deeper and deeper into Johnny with every pointed barb and sneer he aims his way, a targeted attack that feels impersonal almost, straight into the core of Johnny's being.

 

Johnny finds that he almost welcomes the intrusion. He knows that most people find him aloof, solitary and unapproachable. Dredd somehow manages to bypass those barriers, straight to business. It stings, but not like the sting of a knife sliding home. It's just the sting of hurt pride and bravado, and they never play for stakes higher than that.

 

Dredd is safe, funny as that sounds.

 

Johnny looks at his face and sees his grimace; his bull-headed stubbornness, his unflinching glare. A tyrant in all ways, and he's like that all the way down. He doesn’t need to peer into Dredd’s mind to know that. And yet, in that sense, Dredd is refreshingly honest.

 

 

So yes, Johnny is tired of love, but this isn't it.

 

And that's fine by him.


End file.
